10 Pop Culture Internet Memes That Should Be Criminalized

Impact

10. Videos of animals engaging in human activities

I hate to break this to you, but do you know why this crap is funny? Because watching it activates the small child in you that gets a kick out of seeing mismatched pairs, e.g., Cats don’t play the keyboard! and, Panda bears don’t use slides! Teehee! That’s it. These animal videos are the lowest form humor there is, save for watching a guy get kicked in the nuts. They’re like a viral version of a broken See ‘n Say toy. Sheep don’t say moo!

Crime: Proliferating idiocy in the first degree.

Sentence: Animal video-makers confined to cages with lions that have been fed nothing but PCP for five days. (Finally, an animal video I’d watch.)

9. Kony 2012

I know it. You know it. Even the brainwashed kids snatched up by Joseph Kony know it. The Kony 2012 documentaries are the most overhyped thing since Jeremy Lin shattered the hurtful stereotype that the Knicks never sign quality free agents. Kony 2012 has inspired millions of young people to feel horribly about all the kidnapping and killing going on in Rwanda. Or is it Burundi? Maybe it’s Guyana. Definitely Guyana. Anyway, someone should probably stop that guy.

Crime: Aiding the notion that watching a viral video makes you a social activist.

Sentence: Filmmaker publicly shamed by being forced to parade naked down the street screaming incoherently. In other words, time served.

8. Call Me Maybe.

We have Canada — America’s freezer — to thank for this one. In the span of a generation, Canadian rock went from Neil Young, Rush, and even Alanis Morisette for god’s sake, to Nickelback, Justin Bieber, and now Carly Rae Jespen and her hit, “Call Me Maybe.” Any person who says, “Call me maybe,” in everyday conversation should be beaten over the head with a hockey stick maybe.

Crime: Conspiracy to commit crimes against music.

Sentence: Jepsen given life without a cell phone. Call you never! Also, Canadians barred from recording songs until they get their shit together. 

7. Zombies

Along with vampires, zombies play a vital role in contemporary American popular culture. Preparing a nation of 300 million people for the inevitable decline of their nation isn’t easy. So instead of honestly coming to grips with this, and the fact that our country’s largest financial institutions are nothing more than zombie banks that will someday eat us all, we’re being conditioned to accept this unpleasant reality through television and movies. Those who doubt this are invited to peruse this list of zombie films, which is longer than the list of Americans who can name the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court.

Crime: Constantly trying to eat our brains.

Sentence: Sent to live with Kardashians. Zombies starve.  

6. ROFL

Because I can frequently find humor in seemingly serious and unfunny things, I laugh often. But never in my life have I been "rolling on the floor laughing." And the people who use ROFL aren’t either, because if they were, they wouldn’t be able to convey their hyperbolic phrasing since they’d be way too busy rolling on the floor laughing.

Crime: Lying

Sentence: Forced to speak exclusively in abbreviations so they can see how dumb they sound. 

5. E-Trade baby

Using talking babies to sell a product is risky because the viewer can take can it one of two ways: either, (a) The product is so good and easy to use even a baby can do it, or (b) Why the hell would I let a baby tell me which product to use, least of all a broker with whom I’m going to invest my money? I will admit though, I’d rather put my money with the baby than Jon Corzine.

One thing that’s always bothered me is that the E-Trade baby’s been around for several years and yet hasn’t grown an inch. Very suspicious.

Crime: Attempting to convince people they’re stupid because they don’t listen to a talking baby.

Sentence: Adopted by Joseph Kony.

4. “Epic fail”

According to morons, every gaffe is an “epic fail.” Putting aside the fact that “failure” and not “fail” is the appropriate word there, this is the most overused phrase in pop culture. Did you spill coffee on your keyboard? Epic fail. Did you get shut down when you asked out that girl? Epic fail. Did you misspell “epic fail” because you were texting too fast? Epic fail.

These are not epic failures. Napoleon’s invasion of Russia was an epic failure. The Titanic’s maiden voyage was an epic failure. John F. Kennedy’s secret service detail in Dallas was an epic failure.   

Crime: Exaggeration in the epic degree

Sentence: People who use phrase to describe minor snafus must read a book with no pictures.

3. Rickrolling

Believe it or not I got e-mail only a couple of weeks ago linking a video that was a Rickroll, and somehow the act itself felt like a blast from the past. Folks, the Rickroll is over. Give me the inspired Soviet crooning of Eduard Khil’s Trololo any day.

Crime: Spamming 

Sentence: Deported back to the 1980s. 

2. Whatever the hell this is

This kid can lie to himself, but he can’t to lie to me. He definitely went home that night and pee-peed his bed. This is the kind of song the U.S.military uses at Guantanamo Bay to drive detainees insane. 

Notice that God is present at on the right side of the stage. It’s comforting to know that he’s up there watching over us all during the epic battle between dryness and incontinence.  

Crime: Second worst song lyrics in history behind “Fireflies.” 

Sentence: All evidence of song must be burned, and the ashes buried in an unmarked grave like Hitler was. 

1. Top 10 (and other numbered) lists

If you use social media, you know how ubiquitous lists are. People are attracted to links that begin with, “10 things you should…,” “12 things you shouldn’t….,” “20 movies that…” etc. because it assures the reader that the article is broken up into short sections, like the Da Vinci Code. Admittedly, my list here is hardly much different, except that it attempts to transcend the phenomenon itself. It’s like Wittgenstein said in the Tractatus, “My propositions are elucidatory in this way: he who understands me finally recognizes them as senseless, when he has climbed out through them, on them, over them. (He must so to speak throw away the ladder after he has climbed up on it.)

“He must surmount these propositions; then he sees the world rightly.”

Or whatever.

Crime: Abridgment in the first degree

Sentence: Enjoy a relaxing beverage.    

Now if you’ll excuse me I’ve got a bottle of vodka in my Canada.